


all the broken pieces (you chose to love)

by parttimehuman



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Childhood Friends, Depression, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship/Love, I'd tag this happy ending but I don't want to promise too much, M/M, Minor Character Death, Sadness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:47:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 22,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21848494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parttimehuman/pseuds/parttimehuman
Summary: Life fell to pieces, not suddenly, not violently, but slowly. Softly, the broken parts were caught. Safely, they were held. Lovingly, they were protected, although they could never be put back together.Or: a childhood friends to tragic lovers AU
Relationships: Liam Dunbar/Theo Raeken
Comments: 26
Kudos: 61
Collections: 2019 Thiam Reverse Big Bang





	all the broken pieces (you chose to love)

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written for the Thiam Reverse Bang 2019. My wonderful and insanely talented friend Des convinced me that it was a good idea for the two of us to work together again. Please look at their beautiful [artpieces](https://marauders-mess.tumblr.com/post/189739761986/all-the-broken-pieces-you-chose-to-love) and show them some love! (Love = reblogs, people. Come on, you know this!)

**1995**

It was Thursday, the second of November when she was finally allowed to take her baby home. Nurses kept babbling on and on about the countless things she would have to pay special attention to while she packed her bag and dressed her fragile son in a pair of rompers that were supposed to fit by then but ended up making him look even tinier. Her heart swelled at the sight. She couldn’t wait to sit down in her own home and hold him against her chest, hoping that the sound of her heartbeat would tell him what she didn’t have the words to say; that he was the most precious thing in her life, that she would die for him, that she would kill for him. 

An awful number of signatures on an awful amount of paperwork later, they were released into the world outside together, she and the bundle of blankets in her arms. She walked down the hallway with the slowest of steps, her eyes glued to his sleeping face in the elevator. She was afraid of the wind that hit him when she stepped through the doors outside of Beacon Hills Memorial and she was afraid of breaking him with her strength. She couldn’t remember what else she’d lived for until he’d come into the world. She tried, but she couldn’t remember. 

“No way.” 

The words were barely above a whisper, the voice soft and gentle, but she was so far up inside her own world that she almost fell as the other woman spoke to her. She looked to her left and saw a person so painfully unlike herself securely holding a baby in her arm, smiling confidently, like the life she was protecting didn’t scare her, like she knew how to take care of it. _Like a mother._

“I didn’t know there was another baby being born in this hospital today,” the mother said, looking at her with friendly excitement in her bright blue eyes. 

The truth was that she’d been in the hospital for weeks. The birthing of her son had taken place on an operation table in an emergency C-section and the days after it had consisted of sticking her finger through a hole at the side of a humidicrib and praying for his life not to end before it got the chance to start. While the woman to her left was beaming with the joy of motherhood, she was tired, so utterly tired of the fear she’d been dealing with. 

“I had no idea either,” she heard herself say. She was too exhausted to explain the whole story. And did it even matter anymore, now that she was leaving with her baby boy in her arms? Maybe, just maybe, it was for no other reason than her wish to be the same as this other woman, to be glowing just half as much as her. 

“His name is Liam,” the mother smiled, stepping closer and letting her see the face peeking out from her bundle, “it means strong-willed warrior and protector. It’s Irish, like his grandmother.” 

She was jealous of this woman’s pride. “Um, this is Theo,” she answered, feeling like it was expected. She hadn’t done any research on baby names or their meanings, she’d simply chosen one that she’d liked. 

“Theo,” the other woman nodded. It sounded nice when she said it. “Latin. God’s gift. Beautiful name.” 

“Thank you,” she whispered, although it felt like a stupid thing to thank a stranger for. She checked on Theo again even if he’d done nothing but sleep for literal hours, then she faked a smile and nodded, getting ready to leave. 

“Don’t you have anyone to pick you up?” The other woman called after her. “You’re not going home all by yourself, are you?” 

“Don’t worry about me,” she said, tasting the bitterness that came with the familiarity of her pretend-assurance, “I’ll take a cab.” She wouldn’t take a cab. She wouldn’t have been able to afford one before, and the weeks at the hospital with her boy in intensive care were about to push her from debt into crushing debt. What she hated more than being poor was being pitied for being poor. 

“My husband is getting the car, he’ll be right here. Please, let us drive you.” 

“That really isn’t necessary-”

“I insist,” the woman said. She was stern and friendly at the same time, not leaving a choice but still appearing kind. She was going to be a good mother, this woman. “Please,” she added. “I want to be sure little Theo gets home safely.” 

_Little Theo._ It was the only reason why she broke. “Alright,” she muttered, “thank you a lot.” 

“Oh, don’t worry about it. Maybe our boys will become friends when they’re a little bigger, what do you think? I’m Jenna, by the way.” 

Friends. She didn’t know why she suddenly had a tear in her eye thinking about this woman - Jenna - and her son, the strong-willed warrior and protector as a friend for her baby. “I’m Sue,” she replied.

“Nice to meet you, Sue,” Jenna said. “And nice to meet you, Theo.” 

A moment later, a tall, handsome man pulled up in an expensive-looking car, jumped out and kissed his wife’s cheeks and his baby son’s head a dozen times. He insisted on putting her bag in the trunk for her and helping her into the backseat of his car where she sat next to Liam’s ridiculously huge booster seat with Theo in her arm. 

“Ohh, that’s not far from us!” Jenna declared after she’d told them her address. There was entirely too much excitement there. 

Usually, she didn’t like people knowing where she lived. It wasn’t an impressive place. She could tell Liam would grow up with a swingset in the backyard and an inflatable swimming pool for the summers and a room filled with toys. Meanwhile, the best she would be able to do for Theo was to keep him fed and alive. It made her feel a little sick to be sitting in a car that was too big and too clean and too nice, but her eyes kept drifting from Theo’s peaceful little face to Liam’s, and while she would have run for her own sake, she wasn’t doing things for her own sake anymore. 

She couldn’t possibly know, but it was a little like she had a hunch on that day, about the bond that would later grow between Theo and Liam; a bond that not even life would be able to destroy. 

*

**2000**

“Where do you want to go first?” Liam asked Theo. He was very excited. It was the first time the two of them were allowed to go trick or treating for halloween. Liam’s stepdad David didn’t think they should be all by themselves out on the streets in the dark although both Liam and Theo had promised to behave and to look out for each other, to always look left and then right and then left again before crossing the street and hold on to each other’s hand while doing so. At least David was walking a couple of feet behind them, pretending like he wasn’t there as long as they didn’t need him. 

Theo shrugged before he remembered that Liam probably couldn’t see him shrugging through the tablecloth that Theo’s big sister Tara had cut two holes into for Theo’s eyes. Liam’s parents had bought their son a proper halloween costume from the mall two weeks earlier. It was a black overall with glowing bones on it that turned Liam into a skeleton. Together with the mask that belonged to the outfit, Liam looked cool. After Liam had shown it to Theo one afternoon, Theo went to ask his mom whether she would take him to the mall to pick a costume too. _‘Why don’t you take your pocket money and treat yourself, son?’_ she’d replied before taking a long drag from her cigarette. Theo had never received pocket money from her or anyone else, so stealing her only white tablecloth and dressing up as a ghost it was. 

“Where do you think we’ll get the most candy?” Theo asked back. Of course, he liked dressing up with Liam and he liked going out with Liam even after the sun was down. He liked that the neighborhood was full of decorations too, but the best part of halloween was that he was going to get free candy from someone other than his creepy uncle Frank. 

“It’s not about getting the _most_ candy, Theo,” Liam explained to him then, “it’s about getting the _best_ candy.” Theo didn’t know what he meant. Liam added, “Let’s start at Mrs. Greenberg’s house and go down the street from there.” 

As always, Theo agreed with Liam’s idea and happily came along for the execution. They rang the doorbell, waited for the old but friendly looking Mrs. Greenberg to open her door, yelled “Trick or treat!” and pretended like she couldn’t tell which two kids were underneath the costumes. Liam held out the little basket his mom had made for him and Theo held up his tablecloth with both hands so Mrs. Greenberg could fill the well he created in front of his body with chocolates and goodies. 

“Wow, this is amazing,” he said after the third or fourth house. He’d never had as much candy all for himself and he was sure it was going to last him through the rest of the school year if only he managed to hide it from his sister. “Hey, Liam, can I leave mine at your place?”

“Of course,” Liam nodded. Theo knew that in the Dunbar-Geyer household, everything sweet and sugary went into a cupboard in the kitchen that Liam wasn’t allowed to touch, and he only got to eat some after emptying his plate - vegetables included. Even if Theo would have to obey the same rules though, it was still better than having all of his candy taken away by either Tara or his mom or one of her strange friends, so he thought it was his best option. He was still deep in thought about it when Liam suddenly stopped walking. 

Theo looked up from his candy and found that there were three older kids standing on the sidewalk in front of them. One of them - the boy’s name was Billy, Theo knew the kid well enough to avoid him - started pointing at him and laughing. “What are you supposed to be?” Billy wanted to know. 

“A ghost,” Theo answered. Couldn’t Billy see through the dark mask he was wearing? 

“That’s not even a real costume,” the older kid said. His two friends began laughing too. Theo knew he didn’t look as cool as Liam, but a ghost was still a good costume for halloween, right? 

“Hey boys,” David said, stepping a little closer behind them. “Everything alright here?” 

“Everything’s great,” Billy replied with a big smile that went above Theo’s head and probably towards David behind him. “Theo was just asking if we wanted some of his candy. Thank you Theo.” 

Before Theo could protest, Billy grabbed two hands full of the candy out of Theo’s improvised candy-bag, turned around and started running, his two friends following behind, all three of them laughing. 

David, Liam and Theo himself all reacted differently to this. The first thing Theo noticed was David’s voice calling after the mean kids. “Hey you boys! Give Theo his candy back and apologize!” Theo knew it was no use. 

As always when someone was being mean to him, Theo did nothing. He simply stood there, his hands cramping around the tablecloth, eyes dropping to the sad remains of his candy. He was trying not to cry. 

And then there was Liam. Liam wasn’t like Theo at all. Liam never stayed silent just because he didn’t know what to say. Liam never gave up because he didn’t think he stood a chance. When Theo was treated unfairly, he got sad. When Liam watched Theo being treated unfairly, he became angry. And when Liam was angry, he had things to say. 

Before his stepdad could reach out for him and hold him back, Liam took off after the other kids. They were taller and should have been faster, but they weren’t expecting to be chased down the sidewalk by a furious four-year-old Liam who ran as fast as he could and then kicked Billy’s feet when he was close enough. Billy fell and screamed, but Liam had no time for him to play the victim. He started picking up Theo’s candy from the street and pushed Billy’s two friends away when they tried to stop him. 

“Liam!” David yelled, but Liam wasn’t listening. 

“Take your hands off of Theo’s things!” he screamed, his voice high-pitched and shaky. And then he stepped on Billy’s hand with full purpose and force. Billy wailed and the whole neighborhood began to stare. “Theo’s my friend!” Liam continued, still screaming. He lifted his boot off of Billy’s fingers just to step down on them again two seconds later. “Don’t be mean to my friend!” 

Theo stood a few feet away and stared like everyone else until David dragged a crying and kicking Liam away, arms tightly around Liam’s raging little body until he slowly stopped struggling against the grip. Someone helped Billy up from the ground and David promised to call his parents later that evening while he carried Liam away. Theo picked up Liam’s basket with the candy in it and followed them home, but for the rest of the night and the following two days, he wasn’t allowed to play with Liam. 

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled as he sat on the sidewalk in front of the Dunbar-Geyer house alone. For the next year, he had to get a better costume. 

*

**2001**

“Why do I always have to babysit you boys?” Tara complained as they were on their way to the park. As always, Liam was running ahead, jumping over shadows and collecting cool sticks. Theo tried to ignore his big sister and followed Liam instead. Liam was much more fun anyway. 

“Seriously,” she continued even though they were intentionally not reacting to her grumbling, “why don’t you just stay at home to play? At least there I don’t have to look after you stupid babies.” 

“Because we want to play in the park,” Liam told her. Theo didn’t know why Liam always argued with Tara. She thought she was right anyway, and even if she wasn’t, she simply moved on to the next thing she could complain about. Theo never fought her. She was almost three years older than he and she had a tendency to bite him when he annoyed her. Although he’d warned Liam about it before, and Liam had even been bitten by Tara too, it still didn’t keep Liam from standing up against her over and over again. 

“Playing at home is lame,” he explained. Theo knew that what he meant was, playing at Theo’s home was lame. Playing at Liam’s home was awesome, because Liam had a room full of the coolest toys. Theo especially loved the toy train that covered almost his entire carpet. Jenna also made them sandwiches every time they spent an afternoon at Liam’s, and somehow they tasted way better than anything Theo’s mom or Tara had ever made him. 

At Liam’s home, they were never bored. Plus, they didn’t have to deal with Tara. Liam always said that he wished he had a sibling too, but Theo was sure he didn’t mean it. _‘But you always have someone to play with,’_ was Liam’s main argument. Apparently, he didn’t realize how impossible it was to play with Tara. She thought everything Theo did or said was dumb. The only times she’d ever truly played with him had ended in Theo’s face being smeared with their mother’s lipstick. Mom hadn’t been too happy about it and Tara had pretended like it had all been Theo’s idea. What Liam didn’t understand was that a sister wasn’t a friend who lived in your house. His sister was a traitor. 

The problem was that Theo’s home was a tiny apartment. They weren’t allowed in their mom’s room, the living room and kitchen usually smelled like smoke and Theo had to share his room with Tara. The backyard consisted of concrete and stones - no swingset, no sandbox, not even a basketball hoop like Theo had been wishing for. 

Theo didn’t understand why he and Liam couldn’t play at Liam’s every time. His mom always said that would be exploiting Jenna and David’s generosity, but Liam’s parents made sure to remind him that he was welcome anytime, so he didn’t really get the point. 

At Liam’s, there was enough cool stuff to play with. At Liam’s, there was enough room and soft carpets to sit down on. They never went to the park when they were at Liam’s. They only ever did that when they were at Theo’s, where there just wasn’t anything better to do. 

Because they were only five, Liam and Theo weren’t allowed to go to the park on their own though. Theo’s mom never had time to come with them. Theo didn’t know what exactly she had to do instead, he only knew that he was stuck with Tara as their babysitter. Which really sucked. 

“ _You_ are lame,” Tara said. “It doesn’t matter where you play, it will always be lame because you are.” She walked behind them with her hand stuffed into the pockets of her open jacket while kicking rocks in their direction. She was probably trying to kick them against Theo’s head. 

Liam turned around again to face her, already sucking in air and parting his lips to give her more of his opinion, but Theo tugged at his sleeve and pulled Liam with him, breaking into a run as they were finally at the big meadow in the middle of the park. 

While Theo understood better than anyone how angry Tara could make you, he didn’t like it at all when Liam got angry. It had happened a few times before. Liam never got angry at Theo, but that didn’t make it much better. He got angry at his parents instead, or other kids, or one of their kindergarten teachers, or himself, or things, or the world. When Liam got angry, he always started punching and kicking. Just the air, sometimes, but sometimes also things or even people. 

Theo’s mom had taught him that it wasn’t okay to punch things and especially not people. Liam’s parents had taught him the same thing, and Liam knew it, remembered it. Just not when he was angry. He’d never punched Theo, of course, but watching was almost worse. So when Theo was afraid that Liam might get angry, he simply pulled him away or distracted him somehow. Sometimes, he wrapped his arms around Liam from behind and squeezed them really tight until the fists at Liam’s sides began to uncurl again. Liam struggled against his hold every time, but with his arms pinned he wasn’t strong enough to break out. When it was over, he thanked Theo and they simply went on about their day. 

“Hey Theo,” Liam said with a big smile on his face. He didn’t look anything like angry Liam in that moment. “Have I told you that David is going to teach me how to swim?” 

“That’s cool,” Theo replied, although he didn’t really know how cool swimming was. There was a public swimming pool in Beacon Hills, but he’d never been there, mostly because his mom didn’t care for taking him and the one time Jenna offered he could join them for a day there, Theo’s mom had shut the offer down by stating she didn’t have floaties for Theo. 

“Yeah, he says his dad taught him too before he got into school. Do you think your mom will let you come with us?”

“Where?” Theo asked. 

“The swimming pool, of course. You’re getting into school too, so you need to learn how to swim too. Plus, if I can swim and you can’t, who am I going to go swimming with?”

“You think David would teach me too?” Theo wanted to know. He really liked David. Sometimes when he took Liam and him somewhere, Theo pretended like he was David’s stepson too. After all, Liam looked just as unlike David as Theo did. But if David’s dad had taught David how to swim and now David wanted to teach Liam, maybe it wasn’t one of the things where Theo was welcome to join. 

“If not, who’s going to do it instead?” Liam asked. He had a point. Theo looked at his sister for a moment, his sister who was in second grade already. Did that mean she could swim? 

“Tara?” Tara looked up from the grass she was yanking out of the ground. Theo almost didn’t dare to ask, but he was curious. “Can you swim?” 

“If not, my dad can teach you too!” Liam chimed in. Theo really hoped Tara already knew how to do it. He wasn’t ready to share David’s hypothetical swimming lessons with her. 

Tara rolled her eyes and clicked her tongue. “Of course I can swim,” she said, “I’m not a baby like you. I don’t need a teacher. Everyone in second grade knows how to swim.” 

“Really?” Theo wanted to know. “Who taught you?” He tried imagining their mom in a bathing suit, sitting at the edge of the pool giving instructions and encouraging her kid, but it didn’t seem right. He wasn’t sure uncle Frank knew how to swim either. Plus, it was probably for the better if it wasn’t Frank who’d taken Tara swimming. 

“Why?” Tara snapped. “You don’t believe me? That’s so typical of you. Just because _you_ lie all the time doesn’t mean all of us do, Theo. You don’t know everything about me because you’re my _baby_ brother.” 

Theo hated it when she called him that. “You’re right,” he said, “I don’t believe you.” 

He could tell that Tara was getting angry. She wasn’t like Liam, who forgot himself and his surroundings when he got angry, but she wasn’t like Theo, whose anger just made him freeze for a moment before he started crying either. When Tara got angry, her cheeks turned pink and she spat insults. She’d hit Theo once or twice before, but she liked it better to hurt him with words. 

“So? You’re a dumbass.” 

“So?” Theo retaliated. “Prove it.” 

“You can come with us when we go to the swimming pool,” Liam offered. As long as he wasn’t angry himself, he always played the peacemaker. “Maybe you can help us learn it.” 

“No thank you,” Tara snorted. 

“Because you can’t do it,” Theo said shortly. He already knew that she was lying, so it didn’t matter if she was going to admit it or not, but he couldn’t stop himself from pushing her. 

“I can,” she yelled at him, and then added a little more quietly, “it’s not like it’s hard. It’s just moving in water. The only people who can’t do it are babies like you.” 

“And you,” Theo added. Getting under Tara’s skin felt really good. 

“Are you going to shut up or do I need to cut your hair in your sleep again?” She threatened. 

Theo didn’t want to look like he’d looked the one time that had happened before, but he didn’t want to back down either. “Are you going to admit that you’re a liar and that you can’t swim like everyone else in second grade can?” 

Tara was practically fuming by then. Insulting her was one thing, calling her a liar even. But implying that she wasn’t as good at something as everyone else was really got to her. She jumped up and walked straight to the shore of the little lake belonging to the park, kicking her shoes off as she stood by the water. 

Because she didn’t seem scared, Theo thought for a moment that maybe he’d been wrong after all. Tara was the most annoying older sister in the whole world, but she wasn’t stupid. She wouldn’t get into a lake without an adult around if she didn’t know how to swim, right? 

“I don’t think you should do that,” Liam said from behind her. The two boys were following Tara to the water, but still keeping their distance. “David says swimming in anything but a proper swimming pool can be dangerous.” 

“Not if you know how to swim,” Tara said simply. “I’ve done this a million times before.” 

Zero was the exact amount of times Theo had seen his sister doing it before. “Tara,” he said as she stepped into the water barefoot. She’d left her shoes, socks and her hoodie in the grass. “Mom’s going to be mad if you come home with wet clothes.” The truth was, Theo didn’t want her to go inside the lake, but he didn’t want to take back what he’d said to make her stop. 

“I’ll just say you pushed me,” she shrugged and took another step. 

“Tara,” Theo begged again, but of course, she didn’t listen. Or maybe she did, and that’s why she kept going until only her head was above the water surface. 

At first, everything happened really slowly. Theo held his breath, waiting for something terrible to happen, but the waves of the water stayed soft and calm, no lake monster swallowed his sister whole. “See?” She smiled at him. “Easy.” 

After she’d moved another two feet into the middle of the lake, everything happened too fast for Theo’s brain to understand it. One moment, Tara was looking at him, smiling because she knew she was winning their fight of the day. The next moment, the expression on her face changed and she had to tilt her head up so her face still stayed in the air. Her arms began to flail and her eyes widened, but then they were gone and all Theo could see was hair and hands and splashes of water. 

“Tara!” He yelled, running towards her, but Liam stopped him as he was already knee-deep in water, arms wrapped around Theo from behind the same way Theo did with Liam when Liam lost himself. Except Theo wasn’t losing himself in that moment, he was losing Tara. 

“You can’t swim either,” Liam insisted, “we need to get someone who can. Stay here. Theo, promise me.” 

Theo nodded and Liam took off running, screaming for help, his voice getting further away and out of earshot eventually. Then, everything turned slow again. Theo couldn’t feel his feet, and when he looked at the spot where Tara had been but was no longer, he couldn’t feel the rest of him either. He kneeled and searched under water for a hand to grab, or a foot, or her hair, anything, but he could only go as far as there was still solid ground beneath him, and it wasn’t enough. 

A part of Theo was convinced that she was about to show up again, that she would laugh at him once she did. It was just a prank, he told himself. She was just scaring him because he’d gotten on her nerves. She was only a second-grader, kids that young didn’t actually die. She couldn’t be just gone, it didn’t make sense. She was probably holding her breath for as long as she could just to teach him a lesson. 

Tara held her breath for a long time.

And Theo learned his lesson. 

Liam returned with two grown-ups. Maybe it was five minutes later or maybe half an hour. In any case, it was too late. One of them pulled Theo out of the water and the other one Tara. Tara was still holding her breath. Her eyes were closed and her skin was pale. The guy laid her down and blew air into her mouth, tried to make her heart beat again. 

“Tara,” Theo whispered. Out of all the things he’d done to her, this was the worst. “Tara,” he said. Couldn’t stop saying it. “Tara. Tara. Tara.” But she wasn’t done punishing him. And so she held her breath forever. 

*

**2002**

Liam wasn’t allowed to come out and play. Again. Theo didn’t know what was going on, just that he had to spend his afternoons at home all by himself instead of with Liam. It sucked. He missed Liam, and he missed Tara. Somehow, the same thing had made both of them disappear. 

Theo didn’t remember how it had happened. From his mom he knew that it had been his fault, but he couldn’t recall what it was that he’d said to make Tara walk into the lake in the park. He didn’t remember her dying either, just that she’d been there one moment and gone in the next one. 

The time after, a lot of nothing had been happening. The house had been empty, quiet. There was too much space and too little noise. Theo’s mother hadn’t cried but yelled instead. Theo had been afraid of her then, but she’d started to drink a lot of medicine and from then on, had left him alone. 

Why Liam was in trouble, Theo had no idea. Liam had only wanted to help him. It wasn’t his fault that he got angry. It hadn’t been his fault when he’d gotten angry with Theo’s mother. She’d thrown out all of Tara’s things, simply out onto the street. Theo had been angry as well, but more afraid. Liam was never afraid, and if he was, then he was still more angry. 

What Theo did remember were shards of a broken mirror and some blood. Screams echoing through his home that hadn’t belonged there. Liam’s parents picking him up and acting weird. And from that day on, Liam hadn’t been allowed to play much anymore. 

Not being allowed to go to the park anymore, Theo ended up kicking rocks and tearing grass from the ground for most of the summer until it was almost time for the first grade to start for both Liam and Theo. 

On one of the last days before school, Liam came outside when Theo was lying on his back in the dirt behind his house, staring into the sky and trying to make out animals in the clouds passing over him. 

“Hey you,” Liam said, lying down next to Theo. 

“Hey you too,” Theo said. He wasn’t sure whether Liam was allowed to come over or not, but he was more glad that he wasn’t alone for once than he was afraid of Jenna or David looking for him. 

“Do you want to play Uno?”

“Do we have to?” Theo asked. David had taught them the game during the last Christmas holidays. It wasn’t hard, but Theo still lost every time. 

“You’ll probably win,” Liam told him. “I’m just tired all the time. But Mom says she doesn’t want us to go anywhere else to play, so there isn’t much else we can do. She’s probably sitting in the kitchen and looking through the window.” 

“What did you do?” Theo wanted to know. He knew Liam’s parents were different from his mom. When Liam had done something bad, the consequences weren’t a confusing speech in the kitchen with lots of smoke coming out between his mother’s slurred words. Jenna and David were strict in a way Theo’s mom wasn’t. Still, it didn’t mean Theo knew what was going on this time. 

“Nothing,” Liam said. He sounded like one of the grown-ups, Theo thought. Sometimes they said things that were hard to believe. “They said it’s not my fault. I have to go see a doctor sometimes. And now I have to take medicine also. To make me less angry.” 

Theo hadn’t known that there was medicine to make people less angry. “Does it help?” 

Liam shrugged. “I feel normal. Plus more tired. But I always feel normal before I get angry and after it. So maybe they’re just making me sleepy and nothing else.” 

“Does that mean we’re allowed to play again?” 

“If I behave,” Liam said quietly, looking down as he fished the game cards out of his pocket. 

“I’m sorry I forgot our thing,” Theo said. 

“What?”

“You know, the day before the funeral? When you were here and my mom was being shitty and you got mad at her? I was sad because of Tara. And I forgot to hold you.” Theo had remembered too late that his arms around Liam’s body were the simplest solution. Just a moment too late, and everything had gone wrong. 

“Mom says you can’t do that thing all the time anyway. She says one day it’s going to be you who’s going to get hurt.”

“That’s stupid,” Theo told him. “You’re never going to hurt me.” 

“Not if I take the medicine and try to be good,” Liam replied. Theo didn’t like it. Liam was his best friend who wasn’t going to hurt him, ever, and medicine making him tired didn’t have anything to do with it. 

“Let’s play uno,” he said. Liam tried to smile for a moment and then focused on shuffling the cards. 

*

**2003**

Theo had gotten used to going to school every day, but he still didn’t like classes very much. The teachers made him sit still when his legs were tingling and he wanted to run around. Every time he moved restlessly in his seat, he was scolded for it. He needed to pay attention, they said, but even when Theo tried to do so, he didn’t understand most of the things they were saying. 

Without Liam, he’d be lost. Liam sat right next to him and other than Theo, he didn’t think school was hard. Boring, sometimes, yes, but never too difficult. Liam drew in his school books and on the school tables a lot, which got him into even more trouble than Theo earned for daydreaming, but when Liam listened, he always understood their lessons. 

Many times, Theo asked Liam about an exercise he didn’t understand on their way home from Beacon Hills Elementary School and many times, Liam gave him a short and simple answer. Theo wondered what teachers needed half a day for if Liam could summarize the essentials in the fifteen minutes it took them to the street they both lived it. Plus, listening to Liam talking was way nicer than listening to any adult person Theo had ever met. 

If Theo was being honest, he thought that he learned more on the way back home than he did sitting behind his desk in the classroom, and that wasn’t only because of Liam’s explanations of the stuff he’d failed to follow in class. Even more than that, it was the stuff they discovered by themselves, like everything they knew about horses. 

In the spring, on one of the meadows they passed by after school, a couple of horses had suddenly moved in. Theo saw them but would have been fine moving ahead, but Liam was naturally more curious. It was how they found out what horses liked to eat: grass, the baby carrots Liam always left in his lunch box because he hated them, apples, bread, and also candy, but they didn’t want to share much of the chocolate bar Liam had gotten from his grandma. 

They found out that the electric fence wasn’t actually electric, that horses had really super soft noses and that you had to be very slow and quiet if you wanted to be able to touch them. For a couple of days, the two boys stopped by the horses every time. 

“I’ve always wanted a pet,” Liam said, smiling at the huge animal he was standing in front of. “Having a horse would be awesome, right?”

Theo had wanted a pet as well, but he’d more thought about a cat or a dog. Maybe a hamster. Yeah, the hamster was probably the only thing his mom would ever say yes to. 

“A horse is not a pet,” Theo argued, “you can’t keep it in your house.”

“So?” Liam asked. “It would live in the backyard, then. And in the winter it could sleep in the garage. I would ride it to school every day. That would be so cool.”

“You don’t even know how to ride a horse,” Theo pointed out, “and besides, what would I do then? Just walk next to you and your horse? Lame.” 

Liam laughed. “No, silly. I’d come pick you up. Look at those horses, their backs are so long. Two people can ride on them. And riding a horse can’t be that hard. I mean, it can walk all by itself, right? You only need to tell it where to go.” 

Theo was not at all sure that that was how it worked. “Liam…-” But Liam wasn’t ready to be talked out of the idea forming in his head. 

“I think you only need to practice,” he declared. “I mean, everything works like that, right? Nothing is really hard, you just have to try it once and then do it again and again until you become good at it.” 

Liam shrugged his skinny shoulders like it was nothing to him. He let his fingers trail along one of the horses long necks to its shoulder, resting his flat palm where they both imagined a person would have to sit when riding the horse. Theo thought that Liam was being crazy. The animal was huge and neither of them had any idea how to make it do what they wanted it to. What if it didn’t like being touched like that? Or being sat on? And above all, what would it do if Liam did something it didn’t like? 

“You’re not going to climb on that horse’s back, Li,” Theo said seriously. He liked that Liam had cool ideas all the time, and generally he was a fan of them even when both their mothers weren’t, but trying to ride a horse? Theo felt like that went a little too far. 

“Well, you’re going to have to help me,” said Liam. “I can’t actually jump that high. Just take my leg and push as hard as you can.” He was standing beside a peacefully chewing horse, both hands on its back. He was too short to even see the spot that he was aiming for. Theo was sure that Liam’s idea was a terrible one, but if he knew one thing about his best friend, it was that there was no point in trying to reason with him. What Liam wanted, Liam found a way to get. 

“What if you fall?” 

Liam gave him an annoyed look. They both knew Theo wasn’t seriously denying his assistance with the shenanigan of the day, but he was worried. Liam was too impatient to worry.

“Then you get to say you told me so.” 

“What if someone sees us and tells our moms?” 

“You say that every time.” 

“Yeah, because you’ll get grounded again,” Theo reminded Liam. “And then I won’t have anyone to play with.”

“That was just once.” 

“And it was the worst afternoon of my life,” Theo said. He was serious. They generally weren’t too worried about punishment. Theo because his mom wasn’t home enough to be consequent with him and Liam because he was Liam, but an entire day without the other was hard, and another one of those was to be avoided at all costs. 

“I can just get the horse to that tree trunk over there and use that to help me climb on top of it,” Liam said. Theo looked at it and shook his head. Liam was going to do it anyway. 

“Fine,” he sighed. Liam’s grin stretched from one ear to the other as he lifted one of his legs. Theo gave in, grabbed it and at Liam’s count of three, used all the power in his little body to push his best friend up. Liam wriggled around and struggled when the horse took a little step forward to the next patch of fresh grass, but after a couple of moments he was sitting with his legs left and right of the horse’s middle, hands grasping the frizzy mane. He looked proud of himself, but it wasn’t quite enough to make Theo forget his concern. 

“Okay, so you’ve made it,” he tried, although he knew Liam better than that, “you can come back down now before something happens.” 

“It hasn’t even moved yet,” Liam complained. “How do you think that works? Do I need to give it a command? Like you tell a dog to sit?” 

“I don’t know, Li,” Theo said. Which was exactly why he wouldn’t dare to climb on a horse’s back. But no lack of knowledge or experience could stop Liam. Theo took two big steps back for safety reasons. 

“Hey, horse!” He said, patting its neck with one hand. “Move!” 

The horse was not impressed by it, but when Liam started wriggling around and pressing his legs against its belly, it at least lifted its head. 

“A-ha!” Liam cheered. He’d managed to get its attention. 

Or so they thought. A few seconds later, they both knew better. The horse stuck its nose in the wind and turned its head to the nearest street. It was a calm area usually, but right in that moment, a car came rounding the corner. The engine was loud but the music blaring from its inside was even louder. 

The horse made one jump and then ran off to the far corner of the meadow. Without Liam on its back. Liam had pretty much stayed where he was, except that there was no longer a horse underneath his butt, but the hard ground instead.. 

“Are you okay?” Theo asked, crouching next to Liam, who stared after the horse and clapped dirt and dust from his pants. 

“I’m fine,” Liam replied as he got up on his feet, but Theo could tell that his butt and maybe also his back were hurting. A part of him wanted to say ‘I told you so’, and a part of him wanted to run and get Liam’s mom Jenna so she could make sure Liam wasn’t badly hurt. In the end, he did neither, but at least Liam let himself be convinced that they should head home for lunch so they could meet up again later to play with Liam’s toy train. 

“Theo! Where the fuck have you been, Mister?” his mom yelled from the kitchen the second he entered through the front door. Theo kicked off his shoes and dropped his backpack. He found her sitting at the kitchen table smoking a cigarette. He thought that the smell was gross, and the smoke always made it harder for him to breathe, but she’d told him that she couldn’t stop. Cigarettes were like medicine to her. Theo didn’t understand was her sickness was, but she got angry every time he asked, so he didn’t. 

“At school,” he said, not understanding the question. Usually, his mom was either out or asleep when he came home after school. When Tara had still been alive, she’d been the one responsible for Theo, and Tara hadn’t asked questions like that one, she’d just told him to let her watch tv in peace and go to the room they shared because he was a dumbass. 

“And after that?” His mother wanted to know. 

“I walked home,” Theo said. “With Liam.” He wasn’t quite sure why, but somehow Liam’s name always softened something in her. It seemed okay for him to be with Liam, or over at the Geyer’s house. 

She narrowed her eyes and looked at him, grabbing his chin as if she was searching for something in his face. Theo had no idea what it was.Sometimes, he didn’t know the woman who was his mother at all. “Are you lying to me?” She finally asked.

“No,” he answered. Maybe the Liam-effect wasn’t working this time. 

“School’s been out for almost two hours,” she said. Theo hadn’t known that, but it didn’t surprise him, either. Liam and he had forgotten the time often enough before. What surprised him a little was that this time, his mother suddenly cared about it.

“Sorry,” he murmured. He said that word a lot, although he seldomly truly wanted to apologize. 

“You’re not getting into trouble, are you?” She asked him. Theo wondered if she somehow knew what they’d been up to. Maybe someone really had seen them with the horses. Except it didn’t sound like that was what she meant. “You’re not hanging around any other kids than Liam, are you? Older kids? Like those little rats at the playground?” 

Theo shook his head. She’d warned him from those kids, although she hadn’t told him what was wrong with them, only that he wasn’t allowed near them, but he didn’t want to be friends with anyone except Liam anyway. He’d come across Billy and his friends one too many times already.

“You’re not doing anything forbidden, are you?” Was it forbidden to sneak past a non-electric electric fence and touch other people’s horses? Theo bit his lip. “You’re not letting anyone bully you into running errands for them, Theo?” He let Liam convince him to do stuff he didn’t really want to sometimes, but that was different, right? That wasn’t what she was talking about. 

“I don’t ever want you out on those streets, Theo,” she said, taking a long drag from her cigarette. Theo watched as smoke escaped from between her lips. “You’re not becoming one of those kids. You’re not becoming street trash. Don’t ever even think about it. Don’t ever think those people pressuring you can do worse to you than I can. You, Theo, stay home. You stay in school. You play with the little rich kid from across the street and one day, you go off to college and live a life just like him, yeah?” 

Was she talking about Liam? Why was she saying those things? Theo wasn’t following at all. His mom was actually even worse than the teachers at school, but what worked on them worked with her as well: smiling and nodding, promising to do everything she asked. 

“Yes Mom. Of course Mom.” 

She said some more confusing things while Theo made himself toast with ketchup for lunch and a coffee for his mom.

What Theo’s mom didn’t know was that her son didn’t need to be asked to stick with Liam for the years to come, but it still didn’t mean he would have a life just like the other boy. Little did she know of what challenges life had in store for her baby boy. 

*

**2004**

“Hey boys,” Liam’s mom said with a smile as she stuck her head inside through his bedroom door. He and Theo were sitting on his carpet playing the board game Liam had gotten for his birthday the week before. Theo still hadn’t told him what he’d gotten - they shared the same birthday, which Liam thought was so cool but Theo probably didn’t, although he didn’t know why. 

“Five more minutes,” Liam begged. He’d noticed that it had been getting dark outside, but he liked the game and he was winning. He really didn’t want Theo to go home. 

“Theo,” his mom said, “did your mom tell you she’d come pick you up tonight? It’s almost eight and I don’t mind you being here, but she hasn’t come over yet.” 

Liam looked up and saw Theo shrugging. “I can walk home by myself,” Theo said. It wasn’t far from Liam’s house to Theo’s, but Liam, for one, wasn’t allowed to be outside on his own in the dark, so he figured Theo shouldn’t be either. 

“Don’t worry,” Jenna smiled at her son’s best friend. She crouched next to them and stroked through Theo’s hair like she did with Liam sometimes. “You’re not going outside all alone, Liam and his dad can walk you home. I was just wondering if your mom was home, that’s all.” 

Theo didn’t look at her, only at his own hands. Liam knew that kind of silence. It meant that there was something Theo didn’t want to say. 

“Mom,” Liam said, “remember you promised me Theo and I could have a sleepover? It’s Saturday tomorrow, so why can’t we do it tonight? We haven’t finished our game yet. Theo can just stay here and we can play some more.” 

“We can’t just keep him here, Liam. His mom will be worried where he is.” 

Liam knew that Theo’s mom wasn’t worried as much as his own mother. Theo didn’t like to talk about his home and his family much, especially since what happened with Tara, but Liam knew that home wasn’t the same for the two of them. 

“Can we just call her?” Liam suggested. “She doesn’t have to worry, he’s right here with us. He’ll have dinner and I’ll give him one of my pyjamas to wear and he’ll be back home tomorrow.” 

His mom looked at him like she was trying to think of a reason to say no, so Liam made his best puppy eyes - that was what she always called them. Theo was making himself small and staying quiet, and she must see just as well as Liam did that Theo didn’t want to go home. 

“But don’t you think you can stay up all night because Theo’s here, okay?” 

Liam grinned and Theo finally looked up and away from his own hands, smiling a little when they made eye-contact. 

“No, we’ll be good,” Liam promised. “You know we will.” 

His mom laughed as she got up. “Theo, yes,” she said. “You? Wouldn’t bet any money on it.” 

In the end, Jenna promised Theo’s mom’s mailbox to take care of Theo and feed and wash and dress him although Liam had a suspicion that the other woman didn’t care quite as much. Liam was thrilled that they could spend the entire evening and night together. When he’d been younger, he’d always wished for a sibling, but really, he wanted Theo to be his brother so they could be best friends living and going everywhere together. A sleepover was exactly what he wanted to do every night. 

At first, he wasn’t sure if Theo was looking forward to it as much as Liam did. He was quiet during dinner, even more so than usual. Theo never talked much when other people were around, even if they were just Liam’s parents. When it was just the two of them, Theo told jokes and dreamed up stories. They had long discussions and laughed and talked about everything that came to their minds, but it seemed to bother Theo when others could hear them. Still, that evening at the dining table, something was off. It wasn’t until later at night, when Theo and Liam were lying next to each other in Liam’s bed that Theo spoke up. 

“I don’t know where she is,” he said. 

“Who?” Liam asked, not because he didn’t know, but because he wanted Theo to keep talking. 

“Mom,” Theo answered. He sounded sad. 

“She isn’t home?” Moms weren’t usually the ones to tell their children where they went, but still, Liam never had to wonder where his own mom was. At home, at her part time job at the office, at the grocery store or in town running errands, but in the afternoons and evenings and on the weekends she was with Liam, always. 

“Six days,” Theo said. 

“What?”

“It’s been six days since I last saw her. She was going to go to work. I don’t know where. And then she didn’t come home again.” 

“What do you think happened?” Liam asked. 

He could feel Theo shrugging. “I don’t know. I thought it was cool that she wasn’t home after school all week because I could do what I wanted. But I stayed up at night. I was sitting in the living room waiting for her to come home and yell at me for sitting on her couch. She never showed up.” 

“And she didn’t answer her phone when my mom tried calling her earlier,” Liam added, slowly understanding more and more. 

“I’ve been trying all week, Li. She hasn’t answered once.” 

“Are you worried about her?” 

It took Theo a long moment to think of his response. “I don’t know,” he then said. “Sometimes it feels like I want to cry. But sometimes I’m just mad.” 

“She’ll probably be back soon,” Liam told him. He reached over underneath the blanket and took hold of Theo’s cold hand. It wasn’t good enough, not as good as a mother sticking around, but that didn’t stop him from trying to give Theo at least some comfort. Not knowing if he was right or not, he kept saying that everything would turn out just fine. 

“What if it won’t?” Theo whispered into the dark. 

For a moment, Liam thought that he had no idea, but he couldn’t tell Theo that. “Then you’ll stay here with me instead,” he finally said. 

“It’s not that easy,” Theo said, “I can’t just stay here forever.” 

Liam knew that he was probably right. If Theo’s mom was missing, someone had to go look for her. Someone had to bring her back home and make sure that she wouldn’t disappear again. Someone had to take better care of Theo. Even if he wanted to, he couldn’t solve all problems by sharing everything he had with his best friend. But in that moment, with Theo’s shallow breathing next to him and their hands clutched together, he really, really wanted to. And if he needed to fight the whole world, so what? 

*

**2005**

“Mrs. Martin is mean,” Theo complained. He and Liam were packing up their backpacks to go home after last period had just ended. 

“Because she’s making you do your homework?” Liam asked. 

“What? I told her I didn’t have it. She already wrote me down. Hey, do you think your mom can sign the note she gave me? Or maybe I should learn to do my mom’s signature myself. Tara used to do that, I think.” 

“You’re still going to have to do the homework you haven’t done the last two times, Theo,” Liam reminded him. He was right and Theo hated it. 

He sighed. “I can’t do it, Li. I’ve tried. I don’t get it. I’m too stupid.” 

Liam rolled his eyes. “You’re not stupid. Do you want me to help you with it? We can do it at my place. Just come home with me. You haven’t been over for lunch all week. Mom’s missing you.” 

“You know I can’t do homework at your place,” Theo replied truthfully. They’d sat down at Liam’s desk or at the kitchen table together many times before, but Theo was always either tired or hungry or distracted, and Liam wasn’t very good at not letting himself be distracted. Jenna had established a rule that allowed Theo to come over for homework only if they ate first and then did their exercises separately, one of them in Liam’s bedroom and the other one in the kitchen.

“We can go to the library,” Liam suggested. 

“We’re not high schoolers,” Theo pointed out. 

Liam looked at him like he’d just said the stupidest thing Liam had ever heard. “You don’t have to be in high school to use the library.” 

“Yeah but nobody actually does.” 

“Yeah but maybe we should,” Liam argued. “Unless you want to explain to Mrs. Martin why you’re coming to class without your homework for the third time?” 

“Maybe I should just be sick tomorrow,” Theo said. 

“That’s it, we’re going to the library,” Liam declared. 

“You’re not serious,” Theo sighed, and he was indeed not convinced Liam was actually serious until they were sitting at lunch with Jenna and Liam asked her for a ride to the library. She looked confused and Theo probably defeated, but as always, Liam got what Liam wanted in the end, and although they were the only fourth-graders in the building, the two of them spent the afternoon in Beacon Hills’ library that technically belonged to all schools of the town. 

“Can you explain to me how this works?” Theo asked pointing at his work sheet. Liam didn’t always get As either, but with him it was more a matter of motivation or the lack thereof. For Theo, it was much rather about his ability to keep his eyes open in class and get his brain to focus on something for longer than half a minute. 

“How much do you remember from when we did this in class?” Liam wanted to know. 

“We did this in class?” 

“Fine,” Liam sighed, “I’m showing you how it works by doing the first one, but you have to solve the others on your own or you’ll never learn it.” 

“Thank you,” Theo smiled. He wouldn’t learn it either way. 

Liam pulled Theo’s worksheet closer and took the pencil out of his hand. He began explaining every step along the way to his solution. Theo found it fascinating that instead of remembering things, learning them by heart and then just reproducing them when asked, Liam always either understood things or not, and if he didn’t, he decided not to care about them. 

Theo’s problem was always the same, namely that he didn’t remember what he’d been told about a particular topic, or that he only remembered pieces that weren’t big enough to be connected. He looked at his homework tasks and tried to get his brain to come up with the information he needed, getting vague hints if he was lucky. Meanwhile, Liam looked at them and decided whether he could solve them or not. If it wasn’t always easy, it was still simple to him. 

“... I know Mrs. Martin explained this to us a little differently in class but I think it makes more sense this way because really it’s just common sense, you know? That’s why I do it like this and then... “

It didn’t really make a difference to Theo, but he liked that Liam came up with his own ways sometimes. Slowly, he let his tired head drop to Liam’s shoulder, feeling the arm moving underneath him, Liam’s hand writing on Theo’s worksheet as he kept talking, and talking, and talking Theo to sleep. 

By the time Theo woke up, his neck stiff and hurting a little, Liam had covered the entire back of the paper that had Theo’s failed homework on its front in doodles.

“Sorry,” Theo muttered sleepily. Sorry would have been the right word for the bit of drool on Liam’s shirt maybe, but it was hardly enough considering that had sacrificed his afternoon and dragged Theo to the library to help him with homework only for Theo to fall asleep on him and making Liam waste time while he caught up on the sleep he didn’t get at night. 

“I’m calling Mom to pick us up,” Liam said softly.

“Yeah, that’s fine,” Theo said, “I can do my homework on my own at home.” Liam shouldn’t have had to help him before, but now he’d definitely lost his right to any more support. 

“You’re coming back to my place,” Liam answered simply as he dialled. 

“I need to get this done, Li,” Theo pointed out. As much as he wanted to forget about the homework, Mrs. Martin was going to kill him if he showed up without it _again._

“You need a nap, Theo.” 

Liam got up and Theo started packing his stuff. When he turned his worksheet around, he found that Liam had done all the exercises on it. He wanted to say thank you, but it was hard when Liam was already on his way to do the next too kind thing for him. 

*

**2006**

“What do you think it feels like to kiss somebody?” Liam asked. 

He’d asked himself the question a dozen times by then, but never spoken it out loud. His heart was racing, drumming against his ribcage and his cheeks felt hot. Luckily, it was dark and Theo couldn’t see him. 

Theo was allowed to sleep over at Liam’s every weekend. Not on weeknights, because Liam’s mom was convinced he wouldn’t get enough sleep otherwise. But on Friday and Saturday nights, same as all the holidays, the same thing happened; Theo got into Liam’s bed next to him and their hands found their way to each other under the covers sooner or later and everything was alright. 

“I don’t know,” Theo whispered in response. 

Liam had known that people liked to kiss each other sometimes, but he hadn’t become curious to know what it would be like until he’d seen it in a movie recently. In the movie, the people had also been holding hands, and they’d liked to hug and hold each other in their arms. They’d shared their bed, same as Liam did with Theo, and they’d looked so very happy with their bodies pressed together. 

“Do you think you want to know?” Liam asked. Theo didn’t immediately say something, but that was a very Theo thing to do. He always thought about what he wanted after he was asked a question, not like Liam who had his mind made up and waited for the question to finally be posed. 

“Only if I get to kiss someone I like,” Theo decided. 

“Don’t people always like each other when they kiss?” Liam argued. “I mean isn’t that the point?” 

Theo turned around to face him. Liam couldn’t see his face but he felt Theo’s breath coming in his direction. “I’m not sure,” Theo said. “I know my mom has kissed many people. And about most of them, she’s said that she hates them. I don’t know what the rules are.” 

“We should make our own rules,” Liam suggested. “And those rules say that we only ever kiss people we like. Deal?” 

Theo squeezed Liam’s hand and answered, “Deal.” 

For a moment, LIam almost felt like he was going to say more. Like he was going to ask whether Theo liked him or not. It seemed like a stupid question. They reassured each other of how much they liked another countless times. But that time, it would mean something different. 

Theo always said that Liam wasn’t scared of anything, but he wasn’t quite right. As they lay facing each other, hands entangled, Liam was terrified. He didn’t want to know what it was like to kiss somebody. He wanted to know what it would be like to kiss Theo. And the reason why he didn’t ask the question in the end, was that he feared Theo didn’t want to know what it would be like to kiss Liam back. 

“Good night,” Liam whispered, his voice giving a different shape to the words that had been on his mind. 

“Sleep well, Li,” Theo whispered. Liam had never slept anything but well next to him.

*

**2008**

“Let’s go to your house first,” Liam declared as he and Theo reached the street they both lived in. 

“Why do you want to go to my house?” Theo asked. If he remembered correctly, the plan was to play games on Liam’s computer. If they were lucky, Liam was right and David wasn’t working that night, which meant that they could get him to watch a movie with them. Movie nights with David were awesome because he always made tons of popcorn. Maybe it was also a little bit of something different, but Theo couldn’t know for sure since he wasn’t exactly an expert in the field. 

“To let your mom know you’re sleeping over, duh,” Liam replied, “are you paying attention or what?” 

It was possible that Theo had once again zoned out a little, which happened often, especially when it was just the two boys, and especially when Liam was in the middle of one of his monologues about castles and knights and whatever else made the middle ages so incredibly interesting in his opinion. It wasn’t that Theo thought Liam was boring, it was just that he didn’t care about a world from a few hundreds of years ago, and Liam’s babbling usually didn’t require much interaction. 

“Fine,” Theo sighed, “but you tell her.” 

Liam rolled his eyes. “You know she never says no, right?” Theo did know that. His mother didn’t care a lot about where he went and what he did, as long as he promised her not to hang out with Billy from a few blocks down and his friends. Theo was fairly certain Billy delivered almost as many drugs as he did beatings, and he generally avoided even looking in the general direction of Billy. Being with Liam was okay, had always been okay, and staying at Liam’s house was almost more normal than sleeping in Theo’s own bed. Still, Theo hated having to ask for permission. 

“Hey Mrs. Raeken,” Liam called after Theo had unlocked the door. Theo called Liam’s parents by their first names, but they were a different kind of adults from Theo’s mother. 

There was no reply. “Probably still sleeping,” Theo murmured, and indeed, the boys found her on the couch in the living room, her arm hanging off it in a strange angle, an empty bottle on the ground in front of her. She looked old and broken, cold in inhuman. 

“We’re just picking up Theo’s toothbrush,” Liam said, although Theo had his own toothbrush at the Dunbar-Geyer house and there was nothing to pick up. 

Theo stopped on the carpet in the living room, unsure why he felt compelled to take another look at his mother. It wasn’t an unusual sight, the woman on the sofa, fully clothed, make-up smeared all over her face, the blanket under her instead of on top of her body. Theo was used to the smell of alcohol and smoke and to not getting an answer. But something was still off. Theo tilted his head and squeezed his eyes in an attempt to solve the mystery. 

“Does she look weird to you?” He finally asked. 

“What do you mean, weird?” Liam wanted to know, joining Theo in front of the couch. 

“I mean different than usual,” Theo explained, making a vague gesture at her pretty lifeless looking body. 

It was quiet as they both stared, thinking. The silence stretched. 

“Theo,” Liam said finally. From the sound of it, Theo knew that something was very, very wrong. A second later, Liam’s hand grabbed his own. “Theo.” 

Theo tore his eyes away from her face and directed them to her chest. The very general feeling of horror changed into something painfully specific. Something inside of Theo dropped. 

“She isn’t breathing,” he pressed out finally, moments after the realization had hit him. It wasn’t until then that Liam let go of Theo’s hand and ran to get the telephone. He called an ambulance, and then he called his parents, and then words and images went by Theo in a blur until he was sitting next to Liam in a plastic chair at the hospital. 

“I don’t want her to die,” Theo whispered, almost surprised that he felt that way. His mother wasn’t a _Mom_ like Liam’s. He didn’t see her much and when he did, they didn’t talk or do anything together. It was more like he happened to live in her house, and he’d never known that there was more to it, but in that moment he learned about it the hard way. 

“She’ll be fine,” Liam told him, repeating it again and again until Theo stopped shaking his head every time. 

Whether _fine_ was the right word was debatable, but she was indeed alive, as Theo was told. They’d had to pump her stomach and put her to sleep. They let Theo see her for a few moments, but she was asleep, looking nothing like the woman he knew with too much clean white surrounding her. 

“I’m glad we found your mom in time,” Liam said as they were lying in bed at night. 

“Me too,” Theo agreed, not knowing whether it felt wrong because it wasn’t true, or because it was too true. “If she dies,” he said, “I’ll be the only one left.” 

“Don’t say that,” Liam whispered. 

“It’s true.” 

A minute later, Liam asked another careful question. “Do you ever wonder who your dad is?” 

Theo turned his back towards Liam. “No,” he said, pressing his eyes shut. “What if he’s worse?” 

Finally, Liam didn’t know anything else to say either. 

*

**2009**

It was only September, and yet it was quite cold outside after the sun had set. Liam could have zipped his jacket, but he wasn’t going to be cold for long anyway. With his lacrosse stick in hand, he stood in the driveway to his coach’s house, staring at the windshield of the man’s car.

_Third strike, here I come._

It hadn’t been easy to find out his coach’s private address and it hadn’t been easy to sneak out of the house, not after the weeks he’s been through with his parents. The school year had only just begun and Liam had collected his first two strikes in record time, so he was grounded until further notice, possibly until his eighteenth birthday. 

It wasn’t Liam’s fault. Disappointing his parents wasn’t an ideal way to go, but they’d left him no choice. Stealing supplies from the chemistry department at Devenford wasn’t a hobby and disrupting class more often than was nothing more than a necessary evil, but that was the point exactly; it was necessary. Liam didn’t have anything against his coach either, but the guy was known to be consequent, and Liam couldn’t risk being forgiven for what he was about to do. 

If they hadn’t wanted him to get himself kicked out of school, they should have sent him to Beacon Hills High with Theo instead of getting Liam into Devenford Prep, a private institution with an excellent reputation and the best lacrosse team in the whole state. 

Liam took a last glance around to make sure nobody saw him yet, took a deep breath and tightened his grip around his weapon. He closed his eyes and thought about Theo sitting at a desk in the back of a classroom sleeping. How could they send Liam to a different high school without considering who was going to kick Theo awake before the teacher could notice? Or who was going to give him their notes before an exam? Who was going to make sure Theo would be eating something _every_ lunch break? Who would sit in the library with him to let him sleep leaned against their back? Who would help him cheat his way through tests and write his essays for him? 

Liam released his breath, took a swing and grinned as his lacrosse stick crashed into the windshield, setting off the alarm. 

Elementary school hadn’t been made for Theo. Middle school hadn’t been any kinder to him either. High school was going to eat him alive and spit out his remains before he’d make it to Junior year. 

Liam landed another blow. It wasn’t a problem. He knew what Theo needed. He knew how to help. He couldn’t make Theo a good student either, but he could push him through, could make sure Theo survived the next four years of his life. They weren’t going to stop him. 

The windshield cracked and gave out with the next hit. Lights turned on inside the house and the door opened only seconds later. 

“What the hell?!” Liam heard his coach’s voice from somewhere behind him. A woman was being entirely overdramatic, her wailing worse than that of the car’s alarm system. 

Liam’s plan worked out beautifully. Coach was shocked when he recognized him, several neighbors left their houses to witness the whole show, he managed to make a proper mess of the car because nobody dared to try and stop him while he still had the lacrosse stick in his hands, hammering it down onto the vehicle he stood on again and again and again until his arms were sore by the time two sheriff's deputies arrived. He couldn’t help but smile as he let his weapon fall. 

Because Liam was only thirteen and it was the middle of the night, his parents were allowed to pick him up from the Sheriff’s station and take him home, but he had to come in the next day. Of course, Jenna tried to play the IED-card, insisting that it wasn’t Liam’s fault, that his medication probably needed to be adjusted, that she was taking him to his therapist as soon as possible, but Liam had prepared for that. 

His IED had caused him to explode a couple of times before, but he’d had to do research to find out his coach’s address. He’d taken his bike all the way across town to the place, had thought to bring his lacrosse stick because he’d already known what to do once he got there. Nobody could argue that it was just a _reaction._ It wasn’t. Liam had planned it, and that’s what he told the deputy he had to talk to. 

After almost a week, the principal had finally decided that Liam could no longer attend Devenford Prep. He’d been warned, had been made aware of the consequences, and it had only taken him days to break the rules again. He wasn’t showing remorse either, although he wanted to, feeling more shame than he was prepared for when he had to look Coach in the eyes. They had no hope for him, and that was how Liam’s hope was being kept alive. 

“I hope you’re proud of yourself,” Liam’s mom told him after all was said and done, “because I’m not, Liam.” It was the first time they’d ever truly fought. She didn’t talk to him for a while, and Liam almost started having brief moments of regret when he was in his room all alone and she was downstairs being disappointed in him, but they didn’t last. 

Extreme situation demanded extreme measures. As a result, Liam got into Beacon Hills High and even though he was grounded for the rest of the semester, everything was right again. He slipped Theo some money to buy walkie-talkies and Theo slipped him the little device the next day. They talked all the time when Liam was sure his parents wouldn’t catch him and all the obstacles that came with high school, they took them together, like it had always been meant to be. 

*

**2012**

As always, Liam didn’t realize the game was over until his teammates stopped playing and started cheering. It was like that with him and lacrosse: it allowed him to stop thinking, to stop paying attention to the time passing. The world that began at the edge of the playing field only started to exist again slowly. Liam bumped fists and let his shoulders be clapped, raising his head to the bleachers, eyes searching. 

“Dude, I think I lost count of how many goals you scored,” someone laughed into his ear. 

“If they’re not offering you that scholarship after that game you just made, I’ll lose my faith in the world,” said someone else. Liam was surrounded by bright, grinning faces and shining eyes. 

In the audience on that day, there was a group of strangely out of place looking old men in suits and ties, and they’d only come to Beacon Hills to watch Liam play before they could decide whether he was good enough to join the lacrosse team of the college they represented. Liam hadn’t paid much attention to them, but he knew exactly that he’d just made one of the best games of his life. 

It wasn’t any of those old men that he was looking for, though, it was the same face that he was always looking for, after a good game as well as a bad one, no matter what, no matter where, no matter when. Forever his anchor in the whirlwind of life. But Theo wasn’t sitting in his usual spot on the bleachers. 

“Has anyone seen Theo?” Liam asked. Theo didn’t ever miss Liam’s games although they both knew he didn’t care about sports at all. “Coach? You remember if Theo was here during the game?” All of the faces he searched for an answer told him no with a confused smile, wondering why he wasn’t focusing on what they thought was important. They’d never understand. 

Liam threw his helmet and stick to the ground, peeling off his gear as he marched off the field. 

“Dunbar, where the hell do you think you’re going?” Coach yelled after him. 

“Be right back,” he yelled in reply, breaking into a jog. 

He found Theo where he’d always found him in the difficult moments. There was a quiet, almost hidden corner that technically still lay on school grounds but wasn’t known by any of the other students. It wasn’t anything special, just a shady spot where Theo felt safe from eyes and ears and expectations. A spot that belonged only to the two of them. 

“Hey you,” Liam said. Theo stood leaned against the wall of a building that belonged to their high school, head tipped back, eyes closed. Liam could tell that he was trying to focus on his breathing. 

“Hey you too,” Theo whispered. Liam didn’t remember when exactly it had become their usual way of greeting each other, same as he couldn’t pinpoint the moment when Theo had become to him what Theo was then. _Everything._

“I knew you didn’t bail,” Liam said, not that it needed to be, but he didn’t know where else to start. There was no point in asking Theo of he was alright, or if something had happened with his mom. Pressure only made Theo retreat. 

“They’re probably already getting the red carpet out for you at that stupid college,” Theo muttered. 

Liam shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t know. I haven’t talked to anyone yet.” 

Theo let out a laugh. Liam loved it when Theo laughed, but not like that. It was one of those sounds that sounded like a laugh but didn’t look like one on Theo’s face. He wasn’t thinking that anything was funny. Nothing was making him particularly happy in that moment. 

To the bitter sounding non-laugh he added, “You fucking smashed it, Li. I told you they’d be stupid if they didn’t want you. And that was before you decided to take apart your opponent’s entire defense on your own. Please don’t pretend like you weren’t that good. We both know you were.” 

“I was, but why do you have to say it like that?” 

Theo sighed but didn’t answer for a while. Liam stood leaned against the wall next to him, their shoulders touching. He closed his eyes and listened to Theo’s breathing until they were in sync, which worked, but wasn’t very pleasant since Theo breathed more quickly than Liam. Asthma kept him from sucking in much air with one single inhale, so he needed more of them. 

Liam’s lungs were hurting a little by the time Theo finally spoke. 

“I’m failing math again.” 

“Says who?” Liam asked. “Your teacher or your anxiety?” 

Theo rolled his eyes. “I’m serious. I failed the make-up exam that I shouldn’t even have been allowed to take. There’s no way I’ll ever pass that class. Or high school, for that matter.” 

“You can’t have done that terribly,” Liam argued, because they’d spent too much time studying together. “Just ask if you can do it again and we’ll prepare you even better. You’re doing alright in all your other classes, right? It’s just math. We can do that.” 

“ _We_ don’t need to do it, Liam,” Theo replied. “This is not a _we_ -thing, you get that, right? I’m the one responsible for my grades. I’m the one failing this class. I’m the one who’s too stupid to get through high school.”

Liam made a noise. “You’re not too stupid. You get too little sleep so you have too little energy left to study. You can’t focus during class and you can’t concentrate during an exam. Doesn’t mean you’re stupid.” 

“Same thing,” Theo shrugged. “The result stays the same. I’ll never graduate from high school. And I sure as fuck won’t go to college.” 

“If you think I’m going without you, you’re wrong,” Liam pointed out. 

“Liam,” Theo whined. “Don’t be ridiculous. What? Are you going to tell those old farts you won’t attend their fancy college and let them pay your tuition because you have a messed up kid from your neighborhood to take care of?” 

“Theo,” Liam growled. He hated it when Theo started to talk about himself that way. 

“What? You know I’m right. You weren’t even supposed to go to the same high school. Well, shit happens, and it’s not your fault that you have IED. But college is different. I’m not good enough for that shit. But you are. That’s not going to change just because you want it to.” 

“Shut up. I hate it when you say that kind of stuff.” 

“Because you know I’m right. Because-” 

“Theo, I mean it. Just- Not today, okay?” 

“What are you going to do about it, huh?” Theo joked. Liam turned to face him. 

“That’s right,” Theo added a second later. “Nothing. There’s nothing to do anyway. Not even you can make something out of me.” 

Liam’s anger was a curious thing. Sometimes, it was like it had a will on its own, a will that was stronger than his. Usually, when the anger took over, it resulted in Liam’s fists smashed against the nearest wall until it was painted in blood and his hands numb except for a constant throb. 

Something entirely else had almost happened before when it had been Theo who’d made him angry with his self-deprecating way to speak. Something else it was that time. 

Liam’s hands were on Theo’s shoulders, muscles tense. A second later, his lips were pressed to Theo’s. It would have been too much to call it a kiss. The pressure was too high, the shock too big, Liam’s own as well as Theo’s. 

“I’m sorry,” Liam whispered, face still impossibly close to Theo’s because he was afraid of looking him in the eyes. Really, what he was afraid of was Theo being upset with him. 

Theo sighed and raised his hands, holding Liam’s face in them. For a moment, Liam didn’t know if he was being pushed away or pulled closer. He realized that Theo didn’t know either. 

“I’ve been wanting to do that,” he admitted quietly. “For a really, really long time, actually.” 

“What if I told you,” Theo replied, his breath tickling Liam’s lips, “that I’ve been wanting you to do that. For a really, really long time, actually.”

Liam couldn’t quite believe it, so he kissed Theo for real just to make sure. It felt different then. There was less pressure and more focus on Theo’s direction. Theo’s fingers caressing his cheeks felt nice. Somehow, their lips fit right together. By the time Theo opened his mouth and pulled Liam flush against his chest, Liam had long forgotten about lacrosse or college or literally any damn thing in the world.

Liam breathed out a quiet “fuck” much later before he asked, “Hey Theo, can we do that again? Later at home?” 

Theo smiled and nodded. It was one of his rare, truly genuine smiles that probably nobody else but Liam had ever seen. 

“I think I’d really like that. Just maybe don’t tell your parents about it.” 

Liam laughed. “Hey Mom, can Theo stay over tonight? We’re going to be kissing,” he joked. “But seriously, you know she wouldn’t forbid it even if she knew, right?” 

“I didn’t think that, obviously,” Theo said with a smile. 

“I know,” Liam nodded. “It’s okay. I get it. We don’t have to say anything to anybody.” 

Theo pushed himself off of the wall and pressed another kiss to Liam’s mouth before he turned away to leave. “See you later then.” 

“Later,” Liam murmured, already missing Theo although they were never, ever going to be apart. He’d always known they belonged together. Finally, finally it looked like Theo knew it too. In that moment, Liam could have screamed of joy.

*

**2013**

“We made it,” Liam said, grinning widely as he looked at Theo, who didn’t seem quite as convinced, but put on a smile for Liam either way. He tended to do that, to pretend, if not for himself then at least for Liam. Liam had learned not to let it bother him. 

They’d made it indeed. There they were, standing in front of the entrance to the high school gym in suits and ties. Theo had borrowed his outfit from somewhere and Liam had done him the favor of not asking where, but it didn’t matter that it didn’t really fit. What mattered wasn’t even that Liam had managed to convince Theo to go to prom together, even though the thought did set the butterflies in Liam’s belly off at least a little.

What mattered was, they’d made it out. Together, they’d made it through high school. Ever since Liam had been offered a lacrosse scholarship at the beginning of the year, they’d worked extra hard to make sure Theo would get into the same college. All the studying and the talking about the future had cost Theo almost all of his nerves, but Liam would never forget the day when they’d been lying under the stars in Liam’s backyard on a mild summer night, his hand reaching for Theo’s, his mouth once again unable to shut up about how great it would be to leave town together, to share a place and build a new home somewhere where neither of them had been hurt before. 

_‘Maybe it’s happening,’_ Theo had admitted in that moment, and that’s how Liam had found out that he’d been accepted, but they’d still had to wait for the results of Theo’s final exams, neither of them trusting that they’d be good enough. 

The school year was over, Theo was graduating same as Liam was, his grades not exactly good but sufficient, which had been the entire purpose of the stress of the previous months. They’d dressed up and they were going to celebrate. They were going to shake their principal’s hand and smile for a photo, they were going to pretend to like the music the prom committee had put together and they were going to dance to it surrounded by a couple of hundred of other students. They were going to walk home laughing about how cringey it had been. They were going to fall asleep like they’d had countless times before, in the bed in Liam’s room at his parents’ place. One last time.

The day after, they’d start packing. Liam would catch a flight a couple of days earlier because he was supposed to meet his new coach, but Theo would be there with him in no time. Liam had been dreaming of a new city, of Theo’s hand in his own as they walked down busy streets and got to know a new home. 

“You know there’s one more thing to do,” Theo whispered, pulling out a sharpie from his pocket. 

“What, now? I thought we were going to go in an dance.” 

“You’d know I’d love nothing more than to share a dancefloor with my beloved, sweaty, glittery schoolmates,” Theo joked, “but you’re leaving tomorrow. And this school shouldn’t forget you.” 

Liam took the sharpie in one hand and Theo’s hand in the other. They walked away from the gym and towards the library instead. Although Theo had slept there more often than at the place where he legally lived, it was strange to be in it with no lights on. 

There was one shelf at the library that had been abused for the same thing they were about to do by graduates from Beacon Hills High for many years. Every year, some space on it was cleared and every student wrote their initials on it. Dozens of graduates from that year had already perpetuated themselves. He doubted that high school meant the same to any of them that it did to him, and Theo, and _himandTheo._

Without thinking much, Liam wrote a capital L, and then a D behind it that looked like it had been written by a person with an entirely different handwriting, but Beacon Hills High was going to remember him that way or no way: a little crooked, a little nonsensical. There nonetheless, right in the middle, trying his best. 

He handed the sharpie over to Theo. There was a brief moment of surprise in Theo’s eyes, almost as if he hadn’t thought Liam would expect him to do the same, which was ridiculous. Theo Raeken had the same right to be there, to stay there for as long as it took the school to replace the shelf. He’d tried not to be for the entirety of his time in high school, had tried to be quieter, more invisible, less of a bother, but Liam wasn’t going to let him get away with it that time. 

“Doesn’t hurt, I promise,” he whispered, nudging Theo’s shoulder. 

Theo sighed and smiled back at him. And then he signed his initials right next to Liam’s, smaller in comparison, neat and clean. 

“Goodbye, high school,” Theo murmured, staring at the four letters. “See you never.” 

“Hello college,” Liam added. Theo’s lips did the thing where they mimicked the curve of a smile without the rest of his face matching the expression. He said nothing. They were going to work on it one day at a time, Liam thought. The important thing was that they’d made it. 

*

**2014**

It wasn’t until the new year had begun, and it wasn’t until Liam had just given up hope that it finally happened. On the second of January, with only three days left before Liam was going to head back to college after Christmas break, it finally happened. He was picking up some groceries for his parents to cook, thoughtlessly wandering the aisles of the store with too many items on his arms when he suddenly stopped. His feet came to a halt and his eyes snapped up, body reacting faster than his brain. 

Theo was standing right in front of him. 

Liam thought that he looked different, at first, but then he reminded himself that it had been the first time for the two of them to be apart for more than a day or two in their whole lives, and maybe that was what was giving him the impression. 

“Theo,” Liam said, because he couldn’t think of anything better. He had practiced what he was going to say to him once they met again, but he wasn’t ready, and nothing useful came to his mind as it was truly happening. 

For five months, they hadn’t seen each other, but it wasn’t just that. Almost all through high school, a part of Liam had been preparing himself to part ways with Theo after graduation. What had been the chances of them going to the same college, after all? What had been the chances of Theo even wanting to go to college in the first place? Zero, as Liam knew by then. Absolutely zero, but he’d believed in something different. Theo had made him believe in something different. 

Theo opened his mouth as if to say something, but didn’t. Liam wasn’t sure whether he was wishing for an apology, or an explanation, or none of those things. For months, he’d been trying to get Theo to talk to him, to say something - anything at all - but it was unlikely that Theo could tell him something that would make up for what he’d done to Liam. For his betrayal. 

Theo’s lips were parted, but no words made it out. 

Liam had been so excited. So happy, so convinced that their lives had been about to change for the better. Theo’s life, above all. They’d been accepted to the same college. Liam had landed a lacrosse scholarship and Theo had finally gotten the miracle he’d deserved, or so Liam had believed. The truth had turned out to be a different one. 

“I was waiting,” Liam murmured. He’d been waiting for so long. Not even just for the time he’d spent sitting in his dorm room staring at a phone that wouldn’t ring, but longer. For almost all his life. For almost all the time he’d known Theo. Definitely since the first time he’d realized in which ways Theo’s home had been different from his own. _Leaving. Starting over on their own. Doing better. Being free._ It had been the dream for so many years. _Their_ dream. A dream that wouldn’t have existed without Theo. Except that Liam had gone to actually live it, and Theo had broken his promise to follow. 

“You said you’d be there,” he added, louder this time, angry because Theo didn’t seem to think that he had to defend himself. “I was at the airport to pick you up. I was waiting for you. I was _waiting_ , Theo.” 

For hours, he’d been pacing around at the airport, sitting down to bury his face in his hands, jumping up again. Praying to the heavens that nothing had happened to Theo. Calling, texting, leaving messages. Again, and again, and again. Sending his mother to the Raeken’s house to check if Theo had still been there. Waiting, for the new beginning. For the big change. For the better life. For their chance to live in a softer, more merciful world. 

Hours had turned into days had turned into weeks had turned into months. Theo hadn’t picked up his phone, hadn’t replied to Liam’s texts, hadn’t done anything but making himself invisible. Jenna had let Liam know she’d seen Theo alive and well in Beacon Hills, but she’d also let him know Theo hadn’t been coming over for dinner anymore, or even just talking to her. 

“You didn’t actually believe I got in, did you?” Theo answered dryly. 

“I did,” Liam countered, “because you told me so.” 

“That was the fantasy, wasn’t it? You and me far away from home, the two of us against the rest of the world. I wasn’t going to ruin it any sooner than necessary.” 

Liam’s anger turned into something else, something that tasted bitter on his tongue and that he almost choked on as it pushed down his throat to lay heavy in his stomach. 

“Why would you do this to me?” Liam asked, because it made no sense. If Theo hadn’t gotten into college and was still stuck in Beacon Hills, then Liam could have made different choices. He could have picked a college closer to home, closer to Theo. They still could have moved in together. What Theo called a fantasy had never been just that to Liam. To him, it had always been a plan. A plan he was ready to adjust if need be. He hated Theo for not giving him the chance to do so. 

“Liam, don’t ask me that,” Theo sighed. “You know it can’t work out in any other way, right? Listen, I get that we were just kids when you decided to be my friend. But you must have known better eventually. You could have stuck to the cool kids in middle school. I mean, if it wasn’t for your IED, you would have gone to Devenford Prep after and things would have been alright. You were stupid to choose me, Liam. So I made a better choice for you. You’re welcome.” 

Theo gave Liam one last look. His eyes said he was sorry, he was hurt, but his thin line that his lips were pressed into said that all had been said and done. He turned around to leave. Liam understood in that moment why he’d been hiding. Of course, the second Liam had arrived in Beacon Hills for Christmas break, he’d gone looking for Theo, but had had no success. ‘Liam,’ his mom had told him softly, ‘I don’t think you’ll find him.’ What she’d meant was that she hadn’t believed Liam should be looking. That she’d feared Theo would only hurt Liam more in case they met. She hadn’t been wrong. 

“You’re an asshole, Theo!” Liam yelled after him. Unshed tears made his words hoarse and ugly. How was it possible to lose someone who’d already not been there? Liam could feel his heart breaking a little more with every one Theo’s steps. “You don’t get to make decisions for me! You don’t get to make me be not stupid! You can’t take that away from me!” 

Theo shook his head but didn’t turn back around. “I did,” he said simply, “and I don’t regret it.” A moment later, he was gone. Out of sight. Liam dumped all his groceries somewhere to his left and ran down the aisle, but no Theo. He looked left and right. No Theo. He hurried to the exit and pushed through a bunch of people. Out front, he saw the old, shitty car that belonged to Theo’s mother disappear from the parking lot. 

“You don’t get to take _you_ away from me,” Liam whispered, but it was only to himself, and on top of that, it was a lie. The new year had only just begun, and Liam was all out of hope already. 

*

**2015**

“Is there anyone you’d like to call?” The deputy asked. 

Theo lifted his head and looked at him, clueless. 

“To come and pick you up, maybe?” 

Theo shook his head. Who would he be calling? He hadn’t seen his mother in a while, but even if she was in town at the moment, neither did he have a number to reach her, nor did Theo believe she would interrupt whatever she was doing at the moment to pick up her son at the Sheriff’s station. More importantly, Theo didn’t want to explain to her what had landed him there in the first place. 

“What about the Geyers?” The deputy wanted to know. Theo took a glance at the guy’s name tag. Parrish. The name didn’t mean much to him, but apparently the ignorance wasn’t mutual. Deputy Parrish probably just wasn’t the kind of guy people in a small town gossiped about as they watched him ruining his life and that was the crucial difference. 

“No,” Theo answered decidedly. He hadn’t talked to Jenna or David in what? A year? Maybe more? They’d tried, truly. He’d missed them for a long time before he’d decided that those feelings hadn’t been helping him move forward. He’d missed them dearly, desperately, painfully; the smell of food being cooked in their kitchen and the touch of Jenna’s hand in his hair. He’d set Liam free though, and the parents he’d always wished he’d had were a part of that sacrifice. 

“Listen, can I just tell you something?” Parrish asked. He clearly wasn’t expecting Theo to stop him from saying what he had on his mind anyway. Theo wasn’t used to being given a choice, so he just kept still and quiet and continued the inspection of his own dirty fingers. 

“You know this needs to stop, right?” Parrish continued. “This is the second time we had to come get you from the cemetery.” 

Theo sighed. Yes, he was aware of it. Thank you very much, Deputy Parrish. Excellent observation skills. The guy must be very good at his job. 

“I just fell asleep,” Theo defended himself. If he was being honest, he found it most rude of people to call the cops on him. It wasn’t like he’d been doing any harm whatsoever. He’d literally been sleeping. 

“Theo,” Parrish said. “May I call you Theo?” Theo didn’t give a shit. “You can’t sleep there. It’s public space.”

“Bullshit,” Theo muttered. 

“It’s not bullshit, it’s-” 

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Theo said. “It’s space that is paid for by taxes and therefor public property. I’m only allowed to exist on my own personal property. Nobody cares that I pay taxes, too. Nobody cares that the grave I was at is my sister’s, a grace that literally nobody ever visits but me, which makes it a lot more private than public to me, but what do I know, right? The important thing is that a bunch of elderly ladies won’t be bothered by the sight of me. I get it, I’ve been here before.” 

“You have an address,” Parrish said simply. “You still live there, right? You have a roof over your head and something better than grass and dirt to sleep on.” 

Theo waved it off. There was no point in even trying to explain to Parrish all the ways in which the home Theo technically still lived in was torturing him. How he hadn’t been able to get a full night of sleep at the place for as long as he could remember. How every corner of the dirty, shitty little house held memories that made up his nightmares. That he didn’t know how many people had a key to it that his mother had given them at one point of her life. 

The only thing people did with a home sometimes that Theo would have been okay with doing as well - was leaving. It was all that it was good for. 

Parrish looked like he wanted to say something else. Theo knew the face he was making well enough. People had looked at him in that way too many times already. It was what they did when they got to see how broken he was, when they felt compelled to give him advice and knew he wouldn’t take it. 

“Can I go?” Theo asked before Parrish could decide it was worth a shot. 

“Yeah,” the deputy said. “You’re free to go. And please don’t be back here so soon, alright?” 

Theo huffed. Parrish should have told that the people who kept making Theo’s life more miserable. Theo got up, pulled the hood of his sweater over his head and left without making the empty promise. It wasn’t in his hands anyway. Life was hell before death, and there wasn’t a thing he could do about it. 

*

**2016**

“What are you doing out here?” Liam asked, his voice soft, the fact that he’d found Theo like a jab to his heart. “It’s way too cold to be sitting on the ground like that. You’ll get sick.” 

“Being sick isn’t the end of the world, Liam,” Theo answered, not moving away from his spot in the cold grass at the park. The last time both he and Liam had been there at the same time must have been many, many years in the past. 

“Sometimes I feel like you don’t trust any way in life that isn’t painful,” Liam said. 

Theo shrugged. “You know me. I like it when it hurts. Reminds me of home.” 

The truth was, nothing reminded him of home more than Liam did. Consequently, nothing hurt more than Liam’s presence. It was almost midnight, almost the second of November and Liam belonged in his dorm room at college where he was building a life that Theo knew nothing about, a life too full of opportunities and greatness for Theo to be able to imagine it. 

Liam said nothing as he stared at his watch, waiting. “Happy birthday,” he whispered a minute or so later. 

It wasn’t really Theo’s birthday. Liam was the one who’d actually been born on that day twenty-one years ago at Beacon Hills Memorial. Theo had been born in mid-October but spent his first days on earth in an incubator. November second was merely when he and his mother had been released from the hospital. Theo didn’t know his exact birthday. Then again, November second was when he’d first met Liam, so there probably was no better date to be considered the beginning of him. 

“Happy birthday,” Theo replied, although the concept was a foreign one to him. 

“I have a wish,” Liam said. 

“A birthday wish? I don’t have any money,” Theo answered, not that he had to tell Liam that. There was no reason for Liam to be there, and there certainly was no reason to be talking about wishes. The universe still owed Theo every single of the ones he’d made as a kid. 

“Meet me at the library tomorrow,” Liam said instead of complaining about Theo mentioning money as if he’d assumed that Liam would make him pay for anything. 

“At the library?” The only reason why Theo repeated Liam’s words was because he was too surprised to find an excuse right away. 

“Don’t make me explain why. If you remember, you’ll be there.” 

Theo shook his head. As if he’d ever stood a chance trying to forget. For most of middle and high school, leaned against Liam’s back and with his head on Liam’s shoulder had been the only way he’d slept. Without the library, he might have long died. 

“What does it matter if I remember?” He murmured. Life wasn’t as simple as in school anymore. Liam couldn’t live for the both of them. Not even back when had it really worked. 

“You know I’ll be back in Beacon Hills soon, right?” Liam asked. 

Theo wondered what Liam expected him to say to that. “Why?” 

Liam shook his head softly and released a deep exhale. He sat down next to Theo and stared in the same direction, possibly going through the same horrible memories as his eyes focused the lake. 

“It doesn’t make sense without you,” he whispered. 

“You don’t mean that,” Theo insisted. Liam’s life away from Beacon Hills had to be good. It was Liam, after all. Liam and a whole world to conquer. It had been the whole point of getting him to move away for college in the first place. 

“I’ll explain to you what I mean,” Liam said. “Meet me at the library. Please.” 

*

**2017**

Liam let himself in through the front door. Theo had never offered him a key, nor would Liam have dared to ask for one, although it was a regular enough occurrence for him to visit by the time. Visit was maybe not the right term for it. As they both knew but never admitted, Liam came to look after Theo. 

The lock was shitty and the door around it even shittier, so one of them relented every time Liam threw all of his body weight against the wood. Without turning the lights on, he marched inside, finding his way blindly. A more than unpleasant scent hit his nostrils, but he’d been prepared. Liam didn’t make a sound. He closed the door behind him, dropped his jacket and kicked his shoes off. 

In the hallway of Theo’s little apartment, he opened a cupboard and gathered everything he needed from it, and then he got to work. Theo was maybe asleep or maybe not quite, but in any case he was lying in his bed, buried underneath all the blankets he owned. He must be sweating like crazy under there, but Liam let him be for the moment, knowing that in a time like that, Theo needed heat against his skin in order to feel a little warmth on the inside. 

Liam saved his greeting. Even if Theo could hear him, he wasn’t going to answer. There was no point in trying to drag Theo out of his hole - Liam had learned that the hard way. Instead, he tried his best to prepare Theo’s apartment for when the storm would have passed. 

At first, he picked up all dirty laundry from the floor, sorting it in three different washing baskets. The contents of one of them he put right in the washing machine once the carpet was clear. From Theo he heard a groan at the humming sound of his laundry being spun. Next came the dishes. Liam collected all used coffee mugs and half-eaten plates, trying not to gag as he threw away what once had been food. Empty pizza cartons and soda cans went into the trash bin. 

Liam made sure that all of Theo’s body was covered before he opened the only window in his little apartment to let in some much needed fresh air. Theo reacted in no other way than folding himself into a ball of human limbs underneath his covers. Liam let him and turned to the poor excuse of a kitchen unit to wash the dishes. 

For a while, it was a simple enough thing, and one that Liam had come to do many times before. He tidied up the only room Theo’s apartment consisted of, washed dishes and laundry, vacuumed the floor, cleaned the bathroom until every surface was nice and shiny. He got Theo’s mail and opened letters that looked important, pinning them to the board above Theo’s desk so they wouldn’t be forgotten. Once the apartment was in an acceptable state, he threw away anything that had become inedible from the fridge and left to get groceries. In less than an hour, he was back and started cooking. 

Liam knew how much Theo hated it when he decided to take care of him. He’d offered to come over, to be there in case Theo needed anything at all, but Theo would never ask him to. It was why he didn’t have a key, because in Theo’s mind a key came with a responsibility, one that Liam didn’t mind carrying, never had, but Theo couldn’t allow himself to let him. Essentially, when Theo was caught too deeply in his depression to get out of bed, he was also unable to fight Liam, so Liam could go ahead and take care of him as he wanted to. 

When dinner was ready and Theo’s place nice and clean, the hard part was about to begin. Liam started by taking away Theo’s blankets one by one, claiming that they needed to be washed, too, which they did. They were damp from sweat and smelled disgusting. Every blanket he peeled away felt like a layer of skin, like Liam was slowly, piece by piece taking away his shell, his protection, leaving him helpless and in pain. 

Instead of fighting back, Theo winced as if he was being physically assaulted, shielding his face with his arms, tears streaming down his face. He almost couldn’t bear for Liam to see him like this, for Liam to even _help_ him with it, but Liam couldn’t bear not to do it, and for all the things he refrained from when it came to Theo, this wasn’t one of them. 

Theo was wearing a hoodie and sweatpants, presumably the same pair since the first day he’d missed work that week. Liam had to threaten to take them off of Theo himself to get him to move out of the bed and into the bathroom. He wouldn’t have minded doing that part too, carefully taking the clothes off of his best friend and making sure the water was warm enough before starting to wash him with it, sitting on the ledge of the bathtub and massaging shampoo into Theo’s hair, but it was too much for Theo. 

In all the years they’d been inseparable, Liam had never seen all of him. He’d used to think there was nothing to it, they’d simply never been on the same sports teams and after Tara had drowned, Theo had avoided swimming pools, so there weren’t many occasions to see each other naked. More than once though, Liam has noticed Theo trying to hide from him, and this was one of them - the shame of having Liam clean his place was almost too much to take, but the shame of having Liam clean _him_ up needed to be avoided at all costs; Theo even moved all on his own to do so. 

“Please,” Theo begged when he came out of the bathroom with damp hair and bare feet. 

Liam wasn’t impressed. “You know the rule,” he said simply. 

Theo did know what Liam wanted, so he took the plate full of food, sat down at the table and started eating, not seeming to particularly enjoy it. Liam didn’t take it personally. 

“Please,” he repeated a while later. 

“Are you going to finish that?” Liam asked in return, pointing at the plate in front of Theo. 

“Promise,” Theo said. He’d thought of it as being ridiculous, but Liam was serious and Theo wouldn’t get him to leave otherwise. 

“I’ll come by tomorrow,” Liam told him softly, apparently satisfied for the moment. Theo hated it when he watched him eating. 

“Please don’t,” Theo begged again. He hated that Liam couldn’t simply let him. All the rest of the world managed not to give a shit about him, so it shouldn’t have been difficult for Liam.

“I won’t if I see you at lunch at my parents’,” Liam said before he left. Theo knew there was no way out of it.

*

**2018**

Liam woke up much earlier than he usually did. He hadn’t closed the blinds before going to sleep and the first sunrays of the morning were tickling his skin, but that was hardly the reason. He turned around and pressed his lazy grin again warm skin, nuzzled his nose against a steady heartbeat. A pair of arms tightened around him. Never in his life had Liam been happier. 

Of course, he didn’t trust it. Finally, he got to wake up next to Theo in exactly the way he’d always dreamed of - with their limbs entangled and not an inch of distance between them. Liam opened his eyes and let them wander, getting lost in awe of what was in front of them. 

There was Theo - right there - peacefully sleeping, bare chest heaving and sinking, breath escaping his lips. The same lips that had kissed Liam like a starving animal during the night. His features were relaxed, eyes closed, but Liam remembered the way they’d looked at him. 

He’d waited so long for Theo to want him that way. For Theo to allow himself to want him that way. And take what he wanted. Liam had waited so long for Theo to touch him in a way that didn’t feel like he was afraid to break him. To look at him like he didn’t think it was forbidden. 

Liam couldn’t help himself. Carefully, he touched Theo’s lips and he traced his jawline with one finger and he combed through Theo’s hair and he drew patterns on his chest and he kissed his cheeks, again and again and again because he had waited too long to be allowed to do things like that, and he had too much to give to hold it back any longer, and if Theo was going to leave him again, it wasn’t going to be because he didn’t think Liam loved him. 

Nothing in the world was as beautiful as Theo, who was a miracle. Liam spent a little over an hour taking little moments from him while Theo was asleep and couldn’t fight it. He watched and touched and kissed, he breathed Theo in and committed all his curves and edges to memory. 

Later, Liam got up and busied himself in the kitchen, afraid to wake Theo with his worshipping. If anything was sacred to him, it was Theo’s sleep. He made coffee and scrolled through his phone, started frying eggs and stopped a thousand times to bury his nose in the shirt he’d stolen from Theo. 

For the better part of the morning, the outside world didn’t exist. The past didn’t exist either, and the future was far away. For Liam, it was enough. He and Theo and a bed that was still warm and some coffee. For Theo, it wasn’t. It was never going to be enough. Never. 

By the time Liam decided to bring Theo his breakfast to bed, the other man was already getting dressed. Liam felt betrayed by how intentionally quiet Theo was being. 

“Don’t do this,” Liam begged, knowing just how desperate he sounded. Knowing too how useless it was. 

Theo was prepared. Of course he was. There was no way for him not to know exactly what Liam wanted. 

“Don’t try to stop me,” Theo said simply. Liam crossed his arms in front of his chest, in front of Theo’s shirt on his own body, stubborn like a child, heart ready to break. 

“I don’t understand why you still can’t have this,” Liam murmured. “You can’t tell me that you don’t want to. Not anymore. Not after last night.”

Theo tried to plead with him. “Liam,” he said, but Liam was getting annoyed by it. 

“What? Are you going to tell me it was a mistake? Are you going to pretend like it wasn’t everything you’ve wanted for half of your life?”

“I have to go,” Theo said, avoiding Liam’s gaze. 

“You don’t have to go, but you’re doing it anyway.” 

“Yeah. You’re welcome.” 

Theo didn’t try to get his shirt back. Instead, he threw on his hoodie and grabbed his shoes, not even bothering to put them on before he opened the front door. At a different time in his life, Liam would have exploded. He would have started shaking first and then screaming, and then he would have smashed the window pane, probably. 

Anger was the strongest thing Liam had ever known, but it wasn’t strong enough in that moment. 

“Theo,” he heard himself saying. 

“What do you get out of it?” Theo asked. 

They’d had the same discussion before. Theo considered himself damaged goods. He thought he was toxic, he thought he was destined to die miserable and alone. Liam would have moved mountains for him, and he hated nothing more than the fact that it didn’t matter. 

“I get to love you,” he answered, same as he always did. 

Same as always, Theo’s head sunk before he disappeared. If Liam had somehow been able to relive all of his worst outbursts, to be consumed by all of the anger he’d felt throughout his life at once, to break all the knuckles and lose himself so completely, so entirely that nothing that felt like _Liam_ would be left, even if it had been possible, it would still not have expressed how much he was hurting, how badly and violently he wanted to disrupt the the reality that he was stuck in - that Theo was stuck in. 

Slowly, quietly, unfairly, he sank to the ground. “I get to love you,” he whispered, but it wasn’t true. He didn’t get to. “I get to love you. I love you. _I love you._ ” If only. If only it was more than his tragic prayer after Theo was gone.

*

**2019**

Christmas time was a strange time. Every year, every December, the world began to change. Every January, every new year, the new beginnings came with the same old strings attached, the same old burdens, the same old misery. But during December, as if they didn’t know better, people believed in a softer version of life for a while anyway. 

You didn’t need to celebrate Christmas to feel it. You didn’t need to have anybody to celebrate it with to feel it. Theo, who had never believed in a god, or a savior, or love that didn’t ask for anything in return, Theo had nothing to do with decorated trees or presents. The blinking lights that framed the houses of Beacon Hills hurt his eyes at night, the town’s center was too crowded for his liking, everything too busy, the little space that was left filled with anticipation. 

And for what? A couple of times, when he’d been a kid, Theo had spent Christmas Eve with Liam and his family. Jenna and David had bought him gifts that he’d tried to unwrap without ripping the shiny paper although he’d never once seen Liam investing the same care. He’d sat at a table with candles on it, and food, so much more food than had been possible to eat. He’d pretended to know the words for the Christmas carols that had been sung. He’d gotten a glimpse into the magic of that one special time of the year, but it had never been enough to make him believe in it. 

For Theo, Christmas brought two things. The first one was rude customers to the gas station he worked at. The second unsolicited present was loneliness. 

The days before Christmas were generally hell for anybody unfortunate enough to work in retail or customer service. Theo’s only company were people who were either on the way to visit family or on the look for a few last forgotten ingredients to the holiday dinner. Mostly, they were adults with badly stretched patience, whining kids waiting in the backseats of their cars, wives and husbands complaining that they were being late. 

Heavy boots carried wet dirt into the shitty little building, one woman gave birth to her second child in the restroom in the middle of the night between the twenty-fourth and the twenty-fifth. Theo mopped the floor too many times in just a couple of days and pretended not to hear it when someone wished him a merry Christmas. There was nothing merry about it. There hadn’t been in quite some years. 

At six o’clock on Christmas morning, Theo’s shift ended. He grabbed his jacket and one of the flower bouquets the gas station offered - the kind that were cheap in price and even cheaper in looks. It was possible that some day, someone would fire him for always taking what he needed without paying, but it was far more likely that nobody cared enough to even notice, let alone confront him with it. 

Theo wasn’t thinking about losing his job, or losing the poor excuse of an apartment that he wouldn’t be able to afford without it, or losing himself anymore than he already had. He wasn’t thinking about anything, really, except how badly he wanted to close his eyes and cover his ears. When the door of the car that was parked at the sidewalk suddenly opened, Theo almost ran right into it. 

“Fuck,” he cursed, picking up the flowers he’d dropped. It shouldn’t have been possible for them to look any sadder. “Fuck,” he then repeated, wishing he hadn’t wasted his curse to something as irrelevant as a near-fall, because out of the stupid car jumped the one person he was never ready to see and always wanted to. 

“What are you doing here?” Theo asked, trying to sound annoyed while the poorly stitched together cracks in his heart started bleeding again. He was never safe. 

“Picking you up,” Liam replied. He looked as beautiful as ever, dressed in shoes that looked like his socks were dry inside them and a coat that looked like wind wasn’t touching his skin. Theo was tired. He was always tired, but in that moment, he was tired in a new way. Giving up on himself would have been easy. Not having convinced Liam to do the same was the one failure among all his failures that made him hate himself the most. 

“Go, Liam,” Theo said, anger straining his voice. “Be with your family.” 

Liam pursed his lips, shook his head, took the flowers out of Theo’s hand and put them inside the car. “Get in,” he ordered. 

Theo was a coward. Every chance he got, he hid and ran, but he never fought Liam when he was standing right in front of him. He just felt like shit, staring back at the reminder of what wasn’t, of what had never been, of what wasn’t his to wish for. He just swallowed and blinked tears away. Over and over again, in his head, he prayed for a way out, but the shade of blue in Liam’s eyes had more power over him than a lifetime worth of trauma. 

Theo got in the car and Liam started the engine. Cold and heat fought each other all over Theo’s skin, shooting daggers inside him, but nothing physical could hurt like having Liam drive him to the cemetery in silence, never asking where to go. 

They hadn’t been at the grave together since the funeral, but Liam knew where to go even in the pitch-black of the night. It wasn’t until then that Theo realized he must have come there on his own, same as Theo had. 

It was also in that moment that Theo realized that Liam’s love for him was like the flowers he left in the cold hard ground under the wooden cross with his sister’s name on it. Sometimes they didn’t even look that bad, and maybe there was some consolation found through them, if only for a short while, but at what cost? 

It was a bit of a drive to the graveyard, and no matter how noble the gesture, Theo’s flowers always faded. He found them withered within a week, having to replace them. There was nothing about Tara being dead that could be changed, there was nothing to receive in return for his efforts. There was no thanks to get. 

Tara couldn’t see or feel or understand all of the love Theo so desperately wanted to give her years after it had been too late. Even if Liam did love Theo, Theo was dead in a slightly different but no less real way. 

“You need to stop trying,” he whispered. He shouldn’t have to tell Liam that, and yet he did, although there was no point. Liam was going to shake his head again, was simply going to tell him no. 

“Why?” 

Theo wished he wouldn’t do this to him. “Because it’s never going to be better than this.” 

“Better than what?” Liam wanted to know. 

“Me,” Theo answered. It was the short version of everything that was wrong with him. With them. Theo was broken and he couldn’t be fixed. He had been born broken and never felt like anything more than that. 

Liam sniffed and raised his head. He looked sadder than he had at Tara’s funeral. Sadder than Theo had seen him before. He tear rolled down his cheek when he pressed his eyes shut. More tears blurred his eyes when he opened them again, trying to look at Theo, trying to get Theo to look at him. He pulled his hand out of the pocket of his coat and touched Theo’s chin. Had Theo not felt dead inside before, the tenderness of that moment would have given him the final blow. 

“There’s nothing better,” Liam said. 

It was a lie. There would be countless better things as soon as Liam would come to his senses. 

“No,” Liam added, answering to the argument Theo hadn’t spoken out loud. “There isn’t.” And then, when Theo thought he couldn’t break any more, Liam added in a quiet, soft voice, “Let’s go home.” 

Such simple words, and yet they held so much meaning. The only thing that was home to Theo was a constant state of misery, but Liam wasn’t letting him return to it in peace. Theo looked at Liam and tried to come up with new words, different words to explain the same thing he’d been trying to get Liam to understand for so long. 

Twenty-four years of ups and downs, of friendship and brotherhood and love. Familial love, childish love, unconditional love, tragic love. It was crazy how two people could live side by side for such a long time and never share the same life. 

“I still don’t understand what you’re scared of,” Liam whispered. “It’s me, Theo. Why are you scared when it’s only me?” 

Because a whole person, a whole life filled with pain and suffering is too much deadweight when you’re shooting for the stars. Because Liam is everything good in the world while Theo is a collection of fuck-ups and fears held together by skin and bones. 

“I’ll leave you alone,” Liam said finally, fresh tears in his eyes. “I promise it. I will leave you here and never try to call or see you again. If you can look me in the eyes and tell me honestly that you’re afraid for _you_ and not me. I dare you, Theo. Say you’re protecting yourself from me and not the other way around.” 

Theo hated him. He hated that Liam knew him well enough to steal his ways out. He hated that he’d let it happen. He hated himself for how weak he was, for how long he stood and stared and remained silent, every passing second a confession. 

The look on Liam’s face didn’t make it seem like he was winning anything, although Theo definitely felt like the loser of their game. Liam’s hand dropped, knuckles brushing against Theo’s. Cold fingers pulled his shaking fist open and pressed into the spaces between his own fingers. Theo felt empty and helpless. 

“You’re my family,” Liam said. “When are you going to start letting me be yours?” 

Theo wished he had an answer to that. He wished he could do something other than be taken apart by looks and touches. It was easy to tell himself that he was unworthy when Liam was out in the world somewhere, learning things and meeting people and living a life that deserved the name. It was hard to say anything at all with Liam’s watery eyes boring into the remnants of his broken soul. 

If it was possible for a heart to shatter and heal at the same time, that was what was going on inside of Theo as Liam carefully put the puzzle together that consisted only of the two of them. Fingers first, palms flat against each other. Like they’d always been meant to be. Bodies closer, chest against chest, hearts beating in synchrony. Breath against skin, Liam’s nose pressed against Theo’s cheek. An arm around him, a hand against his back. Lips pressed over the corner of his mouth, too desperate to make a kiss out of it, just pressure. 

Theo started crying then. He’d never been one for quiet tears. He wasn’t making them look beautiful like Liam was. Theo’s tears came with sobs and a struggle to breathe. Liam held him tighter and sacrificed the almost-kiss so Theo could find shelter in the crook of his neck where he was free to fall apart and cry. For the first time forever, maybe, he didn’t think about stopping. 

Liam wrapped his other arm around Theo and tightened his hold. He whispered promises into Theo’s ears, but the promises that mattered were the ones made by the softness of his neck against Theo’s face and the strength in his shoulders. By his patience to let Theo break and then break some more. 

At some point, Theo managed to wrap his arm around Liam’s neck. His other hand clung to Liam’s coat like everything depended on it. He let tears stream down his face and ugly sobs rock his body, let Liam catch and steady him over and over again. He must have been an eternity. By the time he finally calmed, the sun was rising. 

Over Liam’s shoulder, Theo looked at Tara’s grave in the softly pink light of the new morning. He took a deep breath out. And then he raised his head to look Liam in the eyes, face red and puffy, soul laid bare, nowhere left to run. 

“Today,” Theo said simply. “I’ll start today.” 


End file.
